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Friday, February 20, 2015

A Day in Flight at Udvar Hazy Center

If you ever happen to be out by Dulles Airport, plan a
little extra time to stop by Udvar-Hazy Center, a satellite extension of the
Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC. The center is located in Chantilly, about a
10 minute drive from the airport.
There’s no entrance fee (we parents love that) but there is a parking
fee of $15, not too much to ask for admission and since it’s out in the middle
of nowhere, you do have to park in the lot.

I’m not a space expert by any means, but who isn’t intrigued
by the wonders of flight? The two
hangars house all kinds of aviation machines: helicopters, airplanes, even the
space shuttle Discovery, along with other flight history artifacts. We were there about 1 ½ hours and only made it
through half the museum, so you definitely could spend a good amount of time
there.

My father was in the Army and often talks about flying in
helicopters. At the museum there were
old military helicopters, from the Vietnam War era, which had the kids wondering
if those were the kind their grandfather talks about (who knew they were even
paying attention to his stories.) There
were also countless other military machines, illustrating the discovery and
history of flight.

When we got to the space shuttle, Discovery, the kids’
questions surprised me. What is it? Where was it going? And they were amazed by
the video of one of the launches. It occurred to me that perhaps they’ve never really
seen this thing take off. I’m sure folks
of a certain age, like me, remember the big deal it was, enough for school
teachers to scramble to get the TV in their room, to watch a launch. The Discovery flew its first mission in 1984
and was retired in 2011. In a little
less than 30 years, had space travel become such the norm that we weren’t all
gathered by the TV to watch it take off (or was I just not paying
attention)? Either way, it was an
awe-inspiring thing to see the space shuttle up close.

Along with all the planes and helicopters, there are also
two flight simulators. Tickets are $7-$8
per person for about a 5 minute experience. (Yes, a bit price-y if you’ve got a
big family, but since we didn’t pay admission and I was in a good mood that
day, we went with it.) We chose the
fighter jets option, paired off two per “airplane.” One person is the pilot and the other, the
gunner. The kids and I screamed and
laughed the entire time as our jets escalated, dropped, and rolled – these
things actually do turn 360 degrees. It
was a hilariously good time and proved that, for the security of our country,
none of us should be in military flight.

Fun artifacts? The answers to questions such as: What do
astronauts eat? What do astronauts do all day in space? And questions you probably
never thought about, like: How do astronauts go to the bathroom? Do the women
astronauts even bother to put on lipstick?

Of course, we had to buy the requisite astronaut
freeze-dried ice cream.